For the sake of compression, some of the characters that appear are composites of people I’ve known, and some events appear out of precise chronology. With the exception of my family and a handful of public figures, the names of most characters have been changed for the sake of their privacy.

UPDATE:I am — obviously, I think — not personally suggesting that dark skin tones make you a thug. But this is averywell-worn racial stereotype, and photo manipulation like this has an ugly history. I really don't think there's a benign explanation for crude Photoshopping like this. I've modified the text to make this clear.